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A rumour of funding irregularities has seen Rowing NZ's chief executive return from Germany ahead of his medal-laden team to help an auditor get to the bottom of the claims.
Craig Ross left Munich too early to see this country's rowing stars take a record three gold and two silver medals at the world championships over the weekend.
The chairman of Rowing NZ's board, Bill Falconer, said from Munich last night that Mr Ross's return was by agreement during a discussion on how to respond to a rumour about irregularities in funding applications.
"It came to our attention there may have been some irregularities in some of our funding applications," Mr Falconer said.
"What the board did is say, 'This is only rumour at this point, but we'd like to have control of this, so we appointed an independent auditor to go through all the work, so we could have our own independent opinion on this'.
"But we said to Craig, 'You're the guy who has responsibility for this. You should go back and help with it'. We had a discussion, and said, 'Okay, somebody ought to be back in New Zealand making sure this is done promptly'."
Mr Falconer said he became aware of the rumour as he was preparing to fly to Munich early last week, and the timing could not have been worse.
He had hoped the matter would have been resolved with little fuss by the time he and the rowers arrived home tomorrow, rather than have it overshadow their success, and he still hoped the auditor would be ready with a report for the board.
Mr Falconer did not know the source of the rumour or which funding applications it was about - whether to the Government agency Sport and Recreation NZ (Sparc) or any of his organisation's sponsors - or their potential financial value.
"I don't know the dimensions or the nature of the problem yet - I'm trying to find out. My intention was to find out to scotch a rumour."
Mr Ross, who is sorting through papers requested by the auditor, did not return calls from the Herald.
He returned from almost six weeks away with the rowers at a series of overseas competitions.
Preparing the team to compete at the Munich championships and getting them there cost Rowing NZ about $1.9 million.
Mr Ross told the Herald in May that the cost of preparing and sending teams to world championships had almost doubled in two years.
"We shouldn't be frightened of that figure - we should be embracing it for the development and growth the sport is experiencing," he said.
Sparc said in 2005 that it would invest $4.5 million in Rowing NZ over four years.
-additional reporting: Alanah May Eriksen
